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The APC40 is primarily a performance tool.

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Can one hardware controller satisfy every type of Live user? Possibly not, but Akai's APC40 is here to give it a good go.

The black/grey APC feels solid and certainly won't dismantle itself mid-set. The size, meanwhile, is 'interesting' for something targeting performance use – it's a little big to be comfortably backpacked, and we've done a lot of gigs in bars and booths where this wouldn't fit.

The size makes sense in other ways, though – the controls are clearly laid out, and there's enough room between them for the chubbier-fingered artist.

But where should you put the APC? If it's beside your computer, it might get in the way of your USB, FireWire, or power cables. If it's in front then your screen and keyboard are going to disappear into the distance.

Fact is it's always hard to get a line of sight where you can see what's happening on the APC and what's going on on your screen at the same time.

The left-hand side of the APC's surface holds the clip launch buttons, and below that is the mixer section, including a cue level knob and short faders. The knob-rich right-hand side deals with effect sends, navigation, macro controls, transport and finishes off with a replaceable DJ-style crossfader – DJs will also dig the dedicated nudge and tap tempo buttons.

Round the back there's a USB connection, mains power in, on/off switch, and two footswitch inputs.

In detail

Plug the APC into the mains – you can't power that many lights over USB – and connect it to your computer. Launch Live 8 (or the feature-limited version of Live that comes in the box to get you started), open Preferences, and select the APC as a control surface in the MIDI/Sync tab. Load some clips into the Session View and the clip buttons light immediately to show their status. It's simple.

There are four colour states: Off = no clip; amber = clip loaded; green = clip playing; and red = recording. The APC can't differentiate deactivated clips, though, and we'd prefer it if they disappeared from the grid, but tap a launch button (they're not velocity sensitive, by the way), and it'll flash according to global quantisation before the clip launches, just like on screen.

A red rectangle appears in the Session View, enclosing the first eight tracks horizontally, and the first five scenes vertically (that's right – 8 x 5 = 40). The clips in this area are the ones in focus on the APC clip launcher grid, and you can use the bank select buttons to move this rectangle up/down and left/right in steps of one scene or one track.

Alternatively, press the shift button at the same time to move in steps of five instead. Press the shift button on its own, and the grid 'zooms out' so that each lit button represents an 8 x 5 grid from your Session View, then tap any one of these to jump straight to that grid.

Below the clip grid you've got nine clip stop buttons, and below those, nine track select buttons. At the right are five scene launch buttons. All perfectly sensible.